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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/22541524">in the days before</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/kosy/pseuds/soundthebells'>soundthebells (kosy)</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>The Magnus Archives (Podcast)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Getting Together, M/M, Mutual Pining, Oblivious But Not Idiots, Post MAG159, Unrepentant Fluff, safehouse fic, what do you want from me this is the fluffiest thing i've ever written</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-02-03</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-02-03</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-04-28 14:15:45</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>General Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>3,774</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/22541524</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/kosy/pseuds/soundthebells</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>The questions are almost always mundane, is the thing. Never even capital-c Compelled from him. Just—questions. </p><p>(The first one, Martin remembers quite distinctly, was <i>what’s your favorite color?</i> He’d burst out laughing, and Jon had frowned at him, corners of his mouth pulling down comically. <i>Serious question!</i> Jon insisted. <i>I wanted to know!</i> Martin had kept on laughing even so, and Jon had swatted at his arm, fighting back a smile himself. <i>Fine! Suit yourself! I didn’t want to know anyway, then!)</i> </p><p>(Eventually he’d told him it was an autumnal, muted orange, and Jon had sat back, a satisfied smile tugging at the edges of his lips. <i>Good color,</i> he’d remarked. <i>It suits you. Do you want to ask me one now?</i> Martin had been confused, which he’s pretty sure was reasonable. <i>Does it work like that?</i> Jon squinted at him, raked a hand through his own hair, frowned again. <i>Does it—Martin, of course it works like that.)</i></p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Martin Blackwood/Jonathan Sims</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>73</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>629</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>in the days before</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>i'm going to level with you guys: this is the fluffiest thing i've ever written in my whole life. i do not know how i feel about this fact i really, really hope you like reading it!</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>It always starts the same way: “Can I ask you a question, Martin?” </p><p>Walking through the hills that the safehouse is nestled in, on the couch over cider, into the silence between them in the bed they share every night. Purposefully casual or lighthearted and chuckled or self-consciously serious. It’s certainly <em> one </em> way of satisfying the Beholding, a way of feeding without compromising his humanity.</p><p>He finally does ask one day, because he feels like he has to. “Does this actually satisfy you?” He's hesitant about it, when he finally gets himself to say it aloud, but it had to be done. It’s concerning, honestly, Jon interrogating him like it’s part of what’s keeping him alive even as he's been slowly degrading over the weeks since they fled London, going twitchy and pallid and tired. </p><p>Jon turns his head to gaze over at him with an odd expression he can’t parse for a moment until his face rebuilds itself into a dry smile. “It’s kind of like eating a cereal bar. All things considered.”</p><p>Martin looks away. “Oh.” God, why is he <em> disappointed? </em> What did he <em> want </em> out of that? </p><p>Jon seems to notice, though, because he grimaces and says, “Alright, not—not exactly like that. It’s like—I mean, it’s like eating a cereal bar, but if you’ve been wandering through the woods for a fortnight and you find a cereal bar lying on the ground, it’s gonna be a—a <em> pretty good cereal bar, </em> you know?” Somewhere in the midst of that little speech, he’d gotten ahold of Martin’s upper arm and is looking up at him now with a sort of awkward earnestness that is, at this point, a trademark Jon Expression in Martin’s mind. He’s been doing that a lot, recently. Touching him. Not enough that he would usually notice, except that it’s <em> Jon </em> , and Martin notices everything that Jon does, especially when it includes him. <em> Especially </em> when it’s tucking a curl of hair behind Martin’s ear before flushing and glancing away, or brushing their fingers together while passing him the salt, or drifting off to sleep on the couch with his feet tucked under Martin’s legs. </p><p>“Glad I can be a <em> pretty good cereal bar </em> for you,” Martin replies, voice wry but just a little bit too far on this side of seriousness, which, thankfully, only makes Jon snort. </p><p>They’re on the way to town this time. Their weekly grocery run. It feels odd to call it weekly, considering they’ve done it precisely twice, counting today, but the fact that they’ve been able to do it at <em> all, </em>that fact that he gets to even have this—</p><p>“So can I?” Jon asks again, intent as ever, and Martin shrugs. </p><p>“Fire away, I suppose.” </p><p>Jon breathes in deeply, as if steeling himself. The questions are almost always mundane, is the thing. Never even capital-c Compelled from him. Just—questions. </p><p>(The first one, Martin remembers quite distinctly, was <em> What’s your favorite color? </em> He’d burst out laughing, and Jon had frowned at him, corners of his mouth pulling down comically. <em> Serious question! </em> Jon insisted. <em> I wanted to know! </em> Martin had kept on laughing even so, and Jon had swatted at his arm, fighting back a smile. <em> Fine! Suit yourself! I didn’t want to know anyway, then!)  </em></p><p>(Eventually he’d told him it was an autumnal, muted orange, and Jon had sat back, a satisfied smile tugging at the edges of his lips. <em> Good color, </em> he’d remarked. <em> It suits you. Do you want to ask me one now? </em> Martin had been confused, which he’s pretty sure was reasonable. <em> Does it work like that? </em> Jon squinted at him, raked a hand through his own hair, frowned again. <em> Does it—Martin, of course it works like that.)  </em></p><p>“What would you say your happiest memory is?” Jon asks, hands fluttering awkwardly at his side, like he’s not sure what to do with them. It’s probably true. Jon’s never seemed to fit quite right in his own body, as if he was born with too much life and energy and chaos and <em> self </em> to cram into such a small frame. Lately, as his power grows, that much has only become more true. Like burning a bonfire on a matchstick. </p><p>Martin hums in quiet consideration, turning his head away from Jon to take in the rolling hills around them. They don’t take the car anywhere, don’t want to deal with buying petrol on their limited funds. Anyway, it feels inherently wrong to drive something so mechanical and loud through a place like this. So they’ve done nothing but walk when they want to get somewhere. He’s surprised, honestly, by how little he minds. Besides, the October sun is warm enough on his face, and his thick hoodie keeps out most of the underlying chill in the late afternoon air. And obviously it’s beautiful, too, all lusher and greener and wilder than he’s seen in his whole life. His childhood was mostly spent sequestered indoors, so it’s—odd. Walking outside and inhaling air so fresh it almost hurts his lungs. Jon at his side, close enough to touch. </p><p>“Tough question,” Martin comments, and Jon makes a soft, understanding noise. He sort of wishes Jon would just pull it out of him, make him eloquent and certain in his answer. But he doesn’t seem to have any interest in that, even though it would probably be more beneficial for Jon if he did, feed their shared god better. </p><p>“I can go first if you’d like,” Jon murmurs, hand flitting to Martin’s shoulder for a moment before falling back to his side again, swinging slightly as he walks. “It’s not an easy question to answer once you’ve been alive for longer than a decade or so. I could compel it out of you, but, well, you know—”</p><p>Martin interrupts, “I don’t know, actually. Why <em> don’t </em> you compel me?” and then snaps his mouth shut. </p><p>Jon gives him a long, even look, eyebrows slightly raised. “Why do <em> you </em> think I don’t?” he fires back, and Martin groans in frustration. </p><p>“I don’t know, Jon! It’s not like I’m the most—<em>eloquent </em> person in the world, and half the time I don’t even know the answers to your questions even when they’re literally about me! Either that or it’s something I <em> really </em> don’t know the answer to, like what I think happens after we die or—or—” He sighs, sharp and heavy, and Jon flinches away from him. And just like that, all the anger drains out of him; he doesn’t even know where it came from in the first place. </p><p>“I’m—I'm sorry,” he tacks on, instantly guilty. </p><p>Jon shakes his head. “I-it’s okay,” but the words come out rough like they've been dragged through his throat, and why does everything have to hurt so much now? “You’ve more than earned some good shouts in your time. Especially at me.”</p><p>“It wasn’t a shout,” Martin snaps in return, and then feels worse. Jon shrugs noncommittally and keeps plodding along, head tilted down. <em> Weren’t you walking closer a couple seconds ago? </em>he wonders, and he hates himself for wondering. </p><p>“I don’t know what my happiest memory is,” Jon begins, blatantly steering them away from the topic, voice as soothing and rich as any statement. “I’ve had a few good ones in my time, contrary to popular belief. My childhood wasn’t idyllic by any means, but there were some good things, however few and far between. Reading books in the park, hiding away behind a tree so nobody could find me. University was… fun, I suppose. I had friends for a few years,” his tone goes wistful here, “and of course we had our moments together. D’you know I played guitar back then?” He laughs, a short and self-deprecating bark of amusement, and Martin is startled into laughing too. “Just like every other egotistical male twentysomething.” </p><p>“Did you really?” Martin asks, smiling, because that’s what you’re supposed to do, but also mostly because he wants to. </p><p>Jon shoots him a shy little grin that makes something in Martin’s chest flutter. “Yeah. I don’t know if I was any good, but people humored me.” Knowing Jon, that means he was a prodigy with the thing, charmed everybody he came across. Probably played in a band. It’s a beautiful thought—Jon onstage, beaming and powerful in a way only a human can be, watching as a crowd moves in tandem with the rhythm of the music he creates. </p><p>“I’m sure you were amazing,” he says aloud, and Jon throws a gently incredulous look his way but doesn’t try to refute him, at least. </p><p>He clears his throat. “Still. I’m not sure. I guess, uh,” and he idly scratches at his neck, gazes up over the hills to wear the clouds brush their way across the pale blue sky. “It feels wrong to say I’ve enjoyed the days I’ve spent in hiding from malevolent fear entities, but it’s been—” Jon makes a vague shape in the air with his hands. “Uh, nice? Good,” he eventually settles on, and Martin chuckles a little and wants, more than anything else in this horrifying world, to take this man’s hand, swing clasped palms between them as they walk together. He won’t do that, but he thinks about it, here in this moment with the sun lighting Jon’s dark eyes into something gold-rimmed, not quite of this world, and his silver-streaked hair floating in wisps around his face and the knowledge that they will be going home together later to curl close but not close enough on the sofa by the fire. And he will think about his hands then as well. The rest of him, too, every part, from the strands of hair that don’t quite fit into his messy bun to the worried crease between his eyebrows to the delicate curve of his lips to the lines of his neck to his thin shoulders to his missing ribs to his scarred hands to his hips to his too-long legs to his feet that press up ice-cold against Martin’s shins in bed. His mind, of course. Frazzled and far too quick and discerning for his own good. Full of thought and a burning desire for knowledge that staggers Martin, but also a quiet sort of compassion that has seemed to strangle him for months, twin desires and selves twisted up together in his chest into one raw, furious creature, and he <em> loves </em> him for fighting this battle, for clinging on tight to a kindness whose expression never came naturally to him. It’s been surreal, spending these days with him. Making breakfast for the man he loves every morning and eating it at the same table, Martin can almost forget that he is afraid. </p><p>And Jon thinks it’s <em> good </em>. </p><p>Martin’s not sure whether to laugh or to be just—just overwhelmed with joy. <em> You feel it too, don’t you, </em> he thinks, watching Jon watch him. <em> You can’t not. </em></p><p>“You’re going to run into something if you keep staring at me much longer, Martin,” Jon informs him dryly, lips curling upward into something between a smile and a smirk. “Honestly.” </p><p>He flushes and dutifully turns his eyes back to the road ahead, laughs, “You know, I was <em> going </em> to say I enjoyed my time here too, but—” </p><p>“It was out of <em> genuine concern,” </em> he interrupts, rolling his eyes (isn't it something, really, that Martin had so deeply missed that particular expression of scorn through all those months alone?). “But you didn’t answer my question.” </p><p>“Right,” Martin says, shaking off the unexpected rush of embarrassment—he’d thought he’d long since outgrown that particular habit of looking at Jon in quieter moments; it turns out it’s far easier to get caught when Jon is so often<em> looking back— </em> and launching into a proper reply. “You were right, you know. It’s hard to choose once you’ve really lived enough. You can’t really pick a memory that encapsulates all of it.” He can hear cattle lowing in the distance and smiles reflexively, and to his right, Jon does the same. “There are plenty. It always seems to be the innocuous moments too, doesn’t it? Stuff you don’t really appreciate until you’re looking back on it and you realize, wow, that was—that was really something, you know? I’ve had a couple at the Archives, actually. Talking in the breakroom with Tim and Sasha, or even Melanie and Daisy and Basira, and I just thought, <em> this is good. </em> A few when I was a kid, I suppose. We went to the beach on holiday once or twice, and I stole off alone when I was about seven for an hour and just walked along the shoreline. I stood in the waves, watched the tide go in and out. And—” he risks a look at Jon and finds him already watching him, eyes soft with an emotion Martin can’t even start to think about. “And of course here. I mean, of <em> course </em>.” He puts as much feeling into that <em>of course</em> as he can. “It’s been… really nice here. With you,” he adds, because isn’t that it? Isn’t that all of it? In The Lonely, he’d felt nothing; even neutral detachment was numbed. Then Jon had touched his face and asked him what he’d seen and it was like an explosion had detonated in his head and he’d felt all of it again as hard as he possibly could, but most of all joy, filling up his chest until he wasn’t sure he could even contain it, laughing in weak delirium as he gripped Jon’s burnt fingers with all the strength he could manage. The joy hasn’t faded yet, weeks and countless miles away. He hopes it never does. </p><p>Jon inhales deeply, upper arm brushing against Martin’s as he rolls his shoulders back, and Martin <em> knows </em>there’s no actual metaphysical spark that passes between people, but if there was he’d be going up like dry kindling right about now. </p><p>“Well-fed?” Martin asks, as lighthearted as he can manage after all that. </p><p>Jon just huffs out a breath, lips twitching up. “Sure, Martin.”</p><p>A spike of annoyance, acute enough that it nearly surprises him.  “Well, if you’re not, you could always ask me another question. I said it was fine, you know.” </p><p>“It’s not about being fed,” Jon snaps out. </p><p>“I—it’s not—<em> what?” </em></p><p>He keeps strolling along, seemingly unruffled. “It’s not.” Seemingly unruffled, but his voice is heavy, wearied. “On a feeding-your-god-so-it-doesn’t-feed-on-you scale, all this is—it’s next to nothing, Martin. I’ve told you as much before. When I ask you what the weirdest dream you ever had was, I am throwing the Eye what is essentially a singular Hobknob. And that’s if I was using compulsion, which I’m not, because I do not particularly enjoy ripping information out of people. The Archivist might be okay with it, but I am very much <em> not.” </em> </p><p>“So what’s this, then?” He’s not—he just doesn’t <em> get </em> it. Jon is half-turned away from him like it’s some admission of shame, head bowed, hands shoved deep into the pockets of the jacket Martin’s been letting him borrow. It swallows him up but he refuses to wear his own, insisting that his is far too thin. The jacket is soft and forest green and its sleeves go the full length of another hand past Jon’s fingertips, but he wears it any time they go for one of their walks. Like plenty of things Jon chooses to do, it doesn’t make any sense to Martin. But he loves him hopelessly for it anyway, and now, out of nowhere, hopefully.</p><p>Jon stops, then, in the middle of the road. “Martin,” he says, words coming in fits and bursts. “I want to know you. Not for the Beholding, not for strategy. And I want you to know me too. Because I like you, and I like being around you, and I think it wouldn’t be so bad. Knowing what food you make yourself when you’re sick, or what stupid human things you’re scared of, or what makes you smile for no reason, or what corny movies make you cry. I—” He hunches in on himself, shoulders curling inward, and he starts walking again, this time faster. “I like it, is all.” He is not an eloquent man, Jon Sims, but the ache always comes through with him, always sinks its teeth unerringly into Martin’s throat.</p><p>He stands stock-still for a good five seconds before running to catch up. “Jon. <em> Jon.</em>” He catches Jon’s arm and holds it tight, turns him a little to face him. “Jon, ask me another question. Please.” </p><p>A slight tilt of the head, a wrinkle of the brow that Martin wants to press his lips against until it smooths out. “Alright.” He watches him think for a moment, mouth going tight at the corners, the silence heavy. “Alright,” he repeats, this time with purpose. Another pause, as if he’s considering very carefully, and it hums between them in the clear autumn air.</p><p>“Martin, when did you fall in love with me?” </p><p>There is no compulsion vibrating beneath the words when he says it, but his voice is deep and burning and intense in a way that makes Martin catch his breath, and then the words are tumbling out and he couldn’t stop their desperate immediacy if he wanted to. “It didn’t come quickly or easily. I always thought you were attractive, at least. I couldn’t imagine not thinking that, honestly, even when you were mean to me for no reason and I was frustrated because you rejected another of my statement follow-ups and Tim and Sasha kept warning me off you whenever we went for drinks. It was honestly kind of funny at first, you know? Being hot for the boss and all that. Except it didn’t go away after a couple months like I expected it to. And then I got trapped in my flat for two weeks. And when I came back, you didn’t care, but you did, really, and you looked at me over your glasses. That was part of what did it. Just that look.” He laughs, a little hysterically. “You looked so—concerned. Like you really did believe me and wanted me to be safe. Then we got stuck in that room together when the Hive attacked and you—you asked me if I was a <em> ghost </em> , Jon. That was one of my—my happy moments, which frankly doesn’t say much for the rest of my life, but it was—you were so—but that wasn’t it, either. I don’t know if I could pinpoint it. The time you told <em> me </em> to go home for once, staying at work late. The time we went to lunch together and you insisted on paying the bill even though you didn’t eat anything. The day before you left for the Unknowing. While you were in the coma. When you kept trying to pull me out of The Lonely even after I kept telling you to let me be. When you trusted me for all those months. When we escaped. When we were on the train ride here.” Jon is looking at him, always looking at him, but his expression is more open than Martin’s ever seen it, and it’s—Martin has to laugh again, touch the edges of it, smooth a thumb over his cheekbone, feel the rough skin below. “When we opened the door to the cottage. When we slept in the same bed for the first time and I woke up with your arms wrapped around my neck and your head on my chest. When we got wine-drunk at the kitchen table the next evening and you told me you’d never learned how to play cards. When we went into town for the first time to buy groceries and you looked so serious trying to pick out the best apples. Last week. This morning. Five minutes ago. Now. I’m—” He breaks off to scrub at his face for a second, feeling hot and lightheaded in a way that he might’ve thought is supernatural but knows is all too human. “Sorry. I’m—I know I’m rambling.” </p><p>“I don’t mind,” Jon says, voice hardly more than a breath. “Martin, I…I didn’t—” </p><p>“It’s okay,” Martin tells him, and he waits for Jon to move away. This is how it goes. </p><p>Jon tips his head up to meet his eyes fully and steps once, deliberately, closer, craning his neck back so as not to break eye contact. </p><p>“It’s really, really not, Martin,” he murmurs, and, slowly, goes up on tiptoes to press a kiss, feather-light and gentle, against his lips. Martin doesn’t close his eyes—forgets to, honestly—and watches the way his lashes fall against the fragile skin under his eyes, takes in the freckles scattered across his cheekbones, observes the flush on his cheeks from the wind or from the—well, everything else. It’s warm and just a little chapped and so painfully soft all the breath rushes out of his body as Jon pulls away. </p><p>He chuckles, then; he feels lighter and warmer than he has in years, maybe ever, and he doesn’t know what to do with all of it. “This is where you say it’s better than okay, right?” He wants to kiss him again. </p><p>Jon blushes, barely visible against his darker skin, but Martin notices, never misses a chance to rediscover how well it suits him. “Oh, I—yes. Of course it is.” </p><p>“Good,” Martin grins, and the relief is like relaxing a muscle he’s had tensed and knotted up for years without even noticing. “I was hoping as much.” </p><p>The other man laughs, goes loose and pliant against Martin’s chest but tilts his head up, face suddenly tensed. “Martin, you have to know that I… I do too.” He does know, nods, and Jon exhales, lines of his face smoothing out, and his voice is so tender when he speaks next Martin could cry. “Can I kiss you again?” Blushing and fidgeting with the cuff of his jacket, but asking nonetheless, and God, even after laying everything out in the open, he’s still struck with excruciating fondness for this man, the knowledge that he would break apart worlds with his bare hands to see him smile up at him like this again. He never thought he’d have this, kissing the man he loves in the middle of the road. But he does. He <em> does. </em>They both do.</p><p>“Jon,” and he slides a hand up to curl perfectly under his jaw, “you don’t even have to ask.” </p><p> </p><p> </p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>thanks for reading! feel free to check me out on tumblr @akosyy, point out and bully me for my (likely very obvious because i haven't edited this at all) mistakes, and drop me a comment if you Felt Things Tm or just feel inclined to! &lt;3 </p><p>edit: god martin really fuckin monologues in this one huh??? i can have little a ooc.... as a treat</p></blockquote></div></div>
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